Who Is the Audience for Scott Pilgrim vs. The World?

C. Robert Cargill July 27, 2010

Michael Cera as Scott Pilgrim and Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Ramona V. Flowers - "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World" (2010)

Now that Inception is finally out, only one big question mark remains for the summer: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Based upon the popular comic book, Scott Pilgrim is the story of young hipsters in love. One of those hipsters, a rocker named Scott Pilgrim, soon discovers that his new girl has seven evil ex-loves and he will be forced to fight and defeat all seven if he hopes to spend his life with the girl of his dreams. Revolving heavily around comic book, music, and video game humor, this story has the potential to draw in a large, youthful audience hungry for something geared toward them — but the director, Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz), is a name big enough to bring in older audiences as well. So who exactly will be seeing this movie?

Comic Book Fans

The sixth and final book in the Scott Pilgrim series (upon which the entire movie is based) was released this week to midnight release parties across the country. With a thriving fan base, you can bet these folks will be there opening night, possibly in costume. Comic fans are also likely to buy tickets to multiple screenings in advance, so expect them to see it a couple of times the first weekend — especially if it is as good as it looks.

Video Game Fans

One of Scott Pilgrim‘s selling points is the fact that the characters inhabit something of a video game world. People possess super powers, get into fights that involve complicated combo attacks, and small meters appear everywhere tracking everything from remaining lives to how much longer you have left to pee. And video game fans are eager for a video game movie that doesn’t suck. Since that’s still a ways off, they’re more than happy to claim this as one of theirs and support it.

Movie Nerds
If it is a genre film with a hip cast, expect these guys to come in droves. Arguably, when do they not come in droves to anything projected? They’ll even watch things they know they’ll hate just so they can blog about it. It’s kind of how it works.

Aging Internet Hipsters
That would include me and most of my cohorts. We Aging Internet Hipsters — a phrase gifted to us by Patton Oswalt at his infamous Ratatouille screening (in which many a dirty joke was told in front of impressionable ears) — LOVE Edgar Wright. From his film work to his classic BBC show Spaced, even his tangential work on the comedy series Look Around You, we will watch anything of his once. Expect a lot of Internet love to come Edgar’s way before anyone has even seen the film (possibly even more than he’s getting now).

Teen Girls
The wild card. Every time I see a discussion of this film, no one seems to want to take the teen girls into account. They see comic book and video game references and forget that this is very much a part of the young female culture now. Women are being drawn into genre films more and more (Twilight, anyone?) and this seems tailor-made for the ladies. A cute love story, Michael Cera, and Chris “Captain America” Evans? I think there will be a fair share of girls in the audience for this opening weekend.